MacKenzie rights ship for a 67

Will MacKenzie didn't let a slow start keep him off the fast track tonear the topof the leaderboard at the Memorial Tournament.

MacKenzie, playing in his first Memorial, overcame three birdies on his first four holes at Muirfield Village Golf Club this morning to shoot a 5-under-par 67.

"I got off to a terrible start," said MacKenzie, a third-year PGA Tour player whose victory in August at the Reno-Tahoe Open opened the door for him to play at Muirfield. "I three-putted No. 1, but I was about 80 feet from the hole.

"At (the 200-yard par-3 third) I hit it 4 feet from the hole, but you need to hit it 20 feet short there. That was another bogey."

It was at that point that MacKenzie's fortunes started to change.

"I decided to be aggressive," he said.

A perfect drive on the par-5 fifth hole left him with 213 yards to the pin. He used a 5-iron for his approach and "almost made it."

"I made the eagle putt and thought, 'I can get this back,'" MacKenzie said.

Birdies on Nos. 8 and 9 put him at 1 under at the turn, and he followed that with four birdies on a bogey-free back nine.

"I started the year solidly," said MacKenzie, who tied for fourth at the Mercedes Championship in the Tour's opening event and 18th at the Bob Hope Chrysler Classic on Jan. 21. He hasn't cracked the top 20 since.

"I'm tired of playing bad. I'm trying to dig it out of the dirt."

MacKenzie said he got his first look at Muirfield about five or six years ago while "playing goat tracks on a mini tour." He was visiting friends and attended a round of the Memorial and "was blown away by how lush and pure it is here."

"I've dreamed of playing here," he said. "And now I'm ready to get out of this funk."